Chapter 9 - A War Inside the Gilded Oak
They escaped through a service tunnel.
Arthur survived.
Claire and Toby were placed under federal protection.
Gabriel, Freya, and Elias drove to the abandoned Mercer family house.
The basement contained a steel vault.
Inside were thirty years of records.
Freya found a folder labeled EVELYN.
Gabriel’s mother.
Victor had always claimed she died in a car accident when Gabriel was thirteen.
The file told another story.
Evelyn discovered Victor’s criminal network.
She planned to testify.
Victor ordered her killed.
Gabriel sat on the basement floor.
Freya did not touch him.
Some grief needed space before comfort.
“I spent my life becoming him,” Gabriel said.
“You’re not him.”
“You don’t know what I’ve done.”
“No.”
Freya looked at the files.
“But I know what you do next matters more than what you tell yourself tonight.”
Gabriel looked at her.
It was not forgiveness.
That was why he believed her.
They turned over the records.
Arrests began before sunrise.
Judges.
Contractors.
Officers.
Businessmen.
Victor’s empire cracked.
But Victor remained free.
Then Daniel Harrison called Freya.
The Gilded Oak was burning.
They arrived to flames pouring from the kitchen.
Daniel stood outside.
“I’m sorry.”
Freya stared at him.
“For firing me?”
“For being afraid.”
She nodded.
“That’s different.”
Firefighters contained the blaze.
Inside the damaged restaurant, investigators discovered a hidden room beneath table four.
Victor had been using the Gilded Oak for years.
Freya descended into it.
Photographs covered the wall.
Gabriel.
Arthur.
Elias.
Toby.
Freya.
One photograph stopped her.
It showed her parents.
Taken twenty-eight years earlier.
Her mother was pregnant.
Standing beside Victor Mercer.
Freya stared.
“No.”
Elias came behind her.
His expression told her he knew.
“You knew my parents?”
“Freya—”
“Who was my father?”
Elias closed his eyes.
Before he could answer, a telephone inside the hidden room rang.
An old landline.
Freya picked it up.
Victor’s voice said, “Ask Gabriel why his father paid for your mother’s funeral.”
Freya slowly looked at Gabriel.
Victor laughed softly.
May you like
“Then ask him what your real last name is.”
The line went dead.
